The Flowering: The Autobiography of Judy Chicago
Description
In this provocative and resonant autobiography—now available in paperback—world-renowned artist and feminist icon Judy Chicago reflects on her extraordinary life and career.
Judy Chicago is America’s most dynamic living artist. Her works comprise a dizzying array of media from performance and installation to the glittering table laid for thirty-nine iconic women in The Dinner Party (now permanently housed at the Brooklyn Museum), the groundbreaking Birth Project, and the meticulously researched Holocaust Project. She designed the monumental installation for Dior’s 2020 Paris couture show and, in 2019, established the Judy Chicago Portal, which will help to accomplish her lifelong goal of overcoming the erasure of women’s achievements.
The Flowering is her vivid and revealing autobiography, fully illustrated with photographs of her work, as well as never-before- published personal images and a foreword by Gloria Steinem. Chicago has revised and updated her classic first autobiography with previously untold stories, fresh insights, and an extensive afterword covering the last twenty years. This powerful narrative weaves together the stories behind someof Chicago’s most significant artworks and her journey as a woman artist with the chronicles of her personal relationships and her understanding, from decades of experience and extensive research, of how misogyny, racism, and other prejudices intersect to erase the legacies of artistswho are not white and male while dismissing the suffering of millions of creatures who share the planet.
The Flowering is an essential read for anyone interested in making change, now available in paperback.
Praise for The Flowering: The Autobiography of Judy Chicago
The story of [Judy Chicago's] life…promises to be a rollicking tale.
— Artnews
An intimate [and] revealing account of an artist of grit and gumption who set the pattern for much of the art being made today.
— The Washington Post
Chicago's new autobiography, The Flowering, documents both the historical and contemporary precarity of her work while also reminding readers of her visceral, artistic vision... It is fitting for Chicago to have such a richly illustrated autobiography. Equally dazzling is Chicago's story of her struggles to create the work, to have it seen, and to be respected in the art world... A gripping read.
— Jewish Book Council
When one reads the narrative of [Judy Chicago's] life, one sees how tough a struggle she has had to reach the situation of respect she now enjoys.
— Edward Lucie-Smith, - Artlyst
A meticulous record of the artist's life and career… [Judy Chicago's] writing moves fluidly between accounts of her personal life, her artistic endeavors and struggles, and the evolution of her feminism into a feminist art practice.
— National Museum of Women in the Arts
Combining engrossing, urgent storytelling with illustrations, personal images and a foreword by Gloria Steinem, Chicago relays the story of an artist determined to ensure that women's cultural achievements are permanently valued.
— Time
Like many women artists, Chicago's experiences have taught her that she has to fight marginalization in the art world. As she chronicles her rise in an arena controlled by men, she also explores the genesis of the works that stemmed from those experiences… Chicago's narrative speaks to the power of persistence and remaining true to yourself, especially important in the art world. An unapologetic examination of the life of an artist dedicated to following her passions.
— Kirkus Reviews